News

New ELF Build and Microtutors

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James Brown contributed some photos of an ELF he recently constructed on his kitchen counter, despite several furry obstacles. With James’s ELF and Microtutors added to the gallery, I think the backlog of photos is pretty well cleared up, save for a single Membership Card photo submitted by Cristian Arezzini. I think I may combine Cristian’s submission with a couple Membership Card photos of my own to make a gallery page out of it.

Have you built something with the CDP1802 or its siblings? Got a COSMAC collection to show off? Snap some photos and send them in, along with whatever details you’d like to share. If possible, photos at least 1024 pixels wide are appreciated.

CyberVision Gets Its Due

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In the early days of cosmacelf.com, John Powers contributed two small black and white photos of the CyberVision 2001 and 3001 systems sold by Montgomery Ward beginning in 1978. More recently, Joe Miller, John’s partner in the start-up that would develop the OS and software for the machine, sent in some catalog pages for the computer and a photo of the CyberVision 4001 prototype — even including a block diagram for the machine.

It’s been a long time coming, but the catalog pages and CyberVision 4001 photos have finally been added to the Gallery page originally created for the CyberVision 2001 and 3001. Better still, the page now links to a detailed and personal history of the CyberVision’s development written by Matt Powers, John’s son.

The CyberVision systems stand among the relatively few attempts to create a commercial home computer out of RCA's CDP1802, and today is all but forgotten.

Some Photos from Herb Johnson

Herb Johnson provided a few photos from his exhibit at VCF East 9.1 from April of last year, among them a good photo of a RCA Microtutor system and an embedded application of the CDP1802, a spark control system from Chrysler automobiles. Check out the Gallery page here, and be sure to visit Herb’s page for the event for more photos and complete details.

VCF East 10.0 (2015)

This year’s Vintage Computer Festival East was held in New Jersey in mid-April. Herb Johnson reported via the COSMAC ELF group that there wasn’t a particularly strong COSMAC presence, but the era was well represented, and all these vintage machines are interesting. One of the more notable 1802-related displays was Doug Crawford’s spreadsheet demo for a VIP.

Check out Herb’s coverage of VCF East on his retrotechnology website for more details and links.

More Gallery Additions

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An ELF build from 1978, this one by Neal Granroth, has been added the Gallery. Neal made a few changes to the original design to accomodate ROM and less expensive (and probably less power hungry) 7-segment displays.

P. Todd Decker sent in some photos of a Membership Card and an ELF 2000 system. While there was no backstory provided and both are more modern versions of ELF computers, he posted some nice videos on YouTube that explains their operation in some detail, and additional photos are available on his Flickr page. Follow the links in this new gallery page. The popups in the videos are particularly informative, if you’re just visiting and wondering what all those toggle switches are about.

Those little Membership Card kits are really cool, and one of the few that you can still purchase, build, and enjoy! And the ELF 2000 is still available, to some small degree; see this prior news story.

Two Modular CDP1802 Systems

The Gallery gained a pair of modular, card cage style COSMAC systems, both great examples of the diversity of these computers and the creativity of the people who built them.

Dan Julio submitted photos and his story about the computer he built in high school:

Robert Sheppard contributed this hand-wired machine and the tale of its development:

Great contributions, guys!

© Dave Ruske 2001-2022, except where noted